If you’ve been following the blog, you may remember that last year I spoke a lot about our bedroom makeover. Our apartment makeover is pretty much done now… you can see our sports room here, and our living room here… but the bedroom has always been close to my heart. I wanted it to be just perfect.

Here’s a shot of our old bedroom. Although it was at our old apartment, all the components were pretty much the same. The same mattress of the floor, wooden IKEA shelf and lots of boxes!

You may also remember the post I made about our bedroom concepts way back when last year. This was the concept I came up with after lots of brainstorming and soul-searching. The bedroom is really important to me — it’s the place you wake up in to start the day, and the place you rest your mind before going to sleep. It is important to me that it imparts a sense of peace. We wanted something clean that is not too girly, although I did ask that the bedroom could be a little more feminine since the rest of the apartment is quite masculine. I think it is a good compromise, and the green is quite a neutral-gender colour.

So here we go! This is the new bedroom with the makeover! I think we did a pretty good job of staying true to our concepts.

Here are some shots of the bedside tables and highboy under construction

The biggest part of the makeover (and the most time consuming) was the furniture. We bought some old dressers and side tables in French provincial style off Craigslist and completely re-did the hardware, stripped, sanded and painted for many many weeks. The paint is a white antique lacquer finish from Mohawk, and the handles were purchased from Lee Valley. We also painted the handles with metal paint and I think they look really cool and very similar to the design concept. I’m really proud of the beautiful curvy King-size bed that we custom designed and ordered from Vancouver custom woodworker KLK Woodworking. Kelly was really amazing and built the bed that we dreamed of! It has a French style but it is still whimsical to make the room look a bit more modern. To save money, we ordered the bed unpainted and it took several more weeks of sanding and painting to finish it.

The linens and bedding are where we really splurged though. We really pinched our pennies by buying used furniture and getting a custom bed, but the bedding was something I wanted to make sure was good quality and lasted. After months of looking around online and in stores, I FINALLY found the sheets we were looking for! We got our bedding from Terra Nova Interiors downtown. They are gorgeous Italian Sferra sheets… we purchased the “Alice” coverlet, 3 euro shams, and small green throw pillow in the front. The bed sheets underneath are from HomeSense and the two green throw pillows from the Bay.

I am absolutely in love with the scalloped edges and the texture of the linens!

The lighting is also an important part of any room, so it took me about 6 months to find the right lamps. We finally ordered these white Robert Abbey Piero lamps from Chintz and Co downtown. I like how they are modern (following the Oversize design trend this year), but they are still timeless with a classic design (I hope!) .

Here’s a better shot of the bedside tables we re-did and the base of the lamp. I also made the flower arrangements with silk flowers from Chintz, as well as the vase. Picture frame from HomeSense.

Here’s a shot of the view of the bedroom if you were laying on the bed. The tallboy dresser has a flower arrangement I did from Chintz, as well as two silver and glass candlesticks from them as well. The white shelf holding the candles is from IKEA, and the candles and glass holders are from Wal-Mart. It really sets a romantic mood in the dark with lots of light!

The other bedside table has two beautiful mirrored accessories from Nicole Jane Home. I was looking for something mirrored but couldn’t find what I was looking for from other stores. They are actually one of the few stores you can deliver interior design goodies to Canada (they are based in Vancouver!!) and they have a great selection. I literally just ordered the picture frame and jewelry box, so I haven’t even had a chance to change the default photo yet.

The last finishing touch to the room is of course the picture frame, which I had mentioned in the design concepts is an absolute key to the room. It’s an image from the drive to Tofino… a peaceful forest with a rushing stream. It really brings the room together in my opinion, and I love the green in it. I learned how to custom frame a photo myself at Opus Framing on Granville Island! It’s much cheaper than ordering a frame and it’s actually quite easy to do. Highly recommended for the photographers out there.

So that’s it! The room is finally done and I think it’s pretty similar to the design concepts. I am really happy with it, and Allan and I have been sleeping in it for the past 6 months now and we really love it!

What do you think of the makeover?

Continuing our little apartment makeover series, today’s post is about out Living Room! To see the previous Sports Room one, click here. I’m also including our bathrooms since this is a fairly short post.

To be fair, the “Before” picture isn’t really accurate. Our living room didn’t look like that all the time before … this was in the midst of our craziness preparing for the party and getting the apartment ready. The major changes to the living room were the lamps, the framed photograph, a side table, a new coffee table, and well… cleaning up. We had our sofas from last year and the TV and swiveling TV mount about 6 months ago.

Nevertheless, here is our “After” photo. Much cleaner, better lighting and some small design additions. Leather sectional and Brown Microfiber ‘Nest’ chair from Urban Barn, Vancouver. Floor lamp and table lamps are both Robert Abbey Fine Lighting “Porter” polished nickel lamps, from Chintz & Co.

Noguchi coffee table from the Modern Source. Samsung TV and Sony surround sound, I believe both were purchased at Future Shop. Photograph is my own (see below) and cheap frame is from IKEA

Framed photo.

Our lounging area! I really love the Nest chair… Allan and I use it for watching TV, playing video games and cuddling… it really fits two people perfectly who want to cuddle and watch TV at the same time… it’s kind of a hybrid between a bed and a couch.

Aluminum Side Bistro Table from Urban Barn. Here’s the Porter table lamp. Silk flowers from Thomas Hobbs, with two of my favourite cookbooks … Gordon Ramsay 3 Star and Araxi’s cookbook.

Our fish tank! Finally cleaned up a bit and the plants are really starting to grow with the new light and CO2 reactor I spoke about in a previous post. In fact, if you check that post and look at the tank now… you can really see how much plant growth there is! We’re really trying to aquascape it to look like a real landscape… almost like something out of the Lion King. Stay tuned, I’m hoping the tank gets better and better. In other news, since the aquarium is open on the top, I’m really happy no one spilled a drink into it at the party!

Here’s my computer setup… dual Samsungs and the Logitech diNovo keyboard set and MX Revolution mouse. I’ve had these for ages and seem to just keep replacing them I like them so much.

I thought I’d include the bathrooms too since this is a bit of a short post. Here’s our Master Bathroom. Brown towels and bathmats from The Bay (Distinctly Home) and photo frames from Walmart. Photos in the frames are below.

Framed photos.

Here’s the guest bathroom. Towels and bathmat from The Bay (Distinctly Home) and photo frame from Walmart. Photo in the frame is below.

Framed photo.

And that’s it! What do you think of our living room makeover?

One of the best parts of this process of getting our place finished is finally getting rid of a lot of clutter and junk that we had been accumulating that we really never use. We do have a storage locker in our basement so we’ve been using that to store mostly seasonal items, such as our camping gear. It really makes a big difference in terms of space in our apartment!

We finally finished off the “Sports Room”. Really the easiest way to show the change is to show before and after pictures. Here is the “before”. Previously, as you can see, this room was basically a catch-all for our gear. 3 surfboards, 4 snowboards, 2 sets of wetsuit gear, 2 sets of snowboarding gear, 2 sets of ice hockey gear, 2 sets of golf clubs, plus camping gear and miscellaneous items. Phew! It was a lot of stuff to cram into one room.

And here is the “after” photo! We really wanted the room to feel more like a fun, bright place where we could show off some of our gear but also be functional in terms of storing everything.

That’s when we came up with the idea of mounting our gear to the walls. When we originally measured out the surfboards, we realized that Allan’s longboard was WAY too big for the walls. Then we noticed that there was a strip of wall that actually went above the door… and bingo, the surfboards all fit on the far wall.

We mounted the surfboards using handmade wooden racks made by Hawaiian Gun Racks. They’ve got some padded material on top to keep them from denting the boards, and also a dowel on the end to prevent them from slipping off just in case. They really are both beautiful and sturdy.

We also mounted the snowboards to the other wall. Mounting everything to the walls really freed up a ton of space, and also I think it looks pretty neat. We installed a cabinet to the wall as well, and put all our books and DVDs in there to save space from the living room. We also are using it to hold some of our snowboard gear such as boots and goggles. It’s also a great place to display some photos of some of our adventures.

From left to right… 2010 Men’s Burton Supermodel, 2007 Women’s Burton Feelgood, 2010 Women’s Burton Malolo… Boots: 2009 Burton Men’s Serow Japanese Exclusive Model, 2010 Burton Women’s Supreme Boots

The snowboards were mounted using HangtimeUSA wall mounts. They are plastic mounts that basically hold to the width of the board, so they are easy to pull in and out of the clips. They can also be mounted diagonally. We were really impressed by how sturdy they were, and the mounting hardware that came with them was awesome.

We fit a couple more things into the room like my golf clubs and the skim boards, but most of our gear is still tucked away in the closet in that room. We purchased a used red microfiber sofa that I LOVE and a couple lamps to complete the room. Not pictured are all the game plaques that Allan and I have from working in the video game industry… you get one when you “ship” a game. It’s kind of a fun addition to the room.

The last part of the room I wanted to talk about is probably my favourite… the coffee tables. We covered one of the coffee tables in all the sporting goods stickers that I had accumulated over the past few years, and that Allan has accumulated pretty much his whole life. There’s a lot of history on that table. Not only is it covered with our favourite brands, but it’s covered in memories of accomplishments, events, special milestones in our lives, and our favourite activities. It really completes the room for us.

So what do you think of the transformation?

It’s been a mad dash to try and get everything done for the party this Friday. More than a month of planning, sanding and finishing furniture, sourcing supplies and decorations, and arranging rooms. Realistically, the party would have taken only a couple days to plan and get ready for… but because we are finally making over our apartment, it’s taking a long time.

We moved into our apartment in March; it has been basically 9 months without fully getting our place “finished”. So this party has been a good hard date to aim for to get our place fixed up… but it certainly has been a lot of work for both Allan and I.

This past weekend we managed to finally finish mounting and hanging most of the items that need to be on the wall. The amazing part is how much space it cleared up. I’m planning on doing a room-by-room post, but for today, just a little teaser until I get the finishing touches in place.

This is the “sports room”. A lot of gear has to fit in this room. We finally managed to hang up the surfboards with the handmade wooden racks that we bought. The snowboards are hung up with plastic board mounts. It’s great to get these off the floor… they look so much nicer on the wall. Full room post coming soon.

We also finally managed to finish off the bedroom furniture. Can’t wait to show you before and after photos of the bedroom and also how the furniture looked before the treatment. For now, just a little peek at the paint finish and the new handles we mounted and treated.

Sorry for the short post… more coming soon! So excited that it is all finally coming together.

P.S. Check out the chaos in this room… haha. This is what we’ve been living in trying to get this all finished on time.